Framework Knitters
Art & Culture
We want to capture memories through oral history workshops to uncover and share Ruddington's heritage in a 'Hidden Histories' Exhibition.
About this cause
The Framework Knitters Museum is a unique complex of listed frame-shops, cottages and outbuildings arranged around a garden courtyard with an adjacent former chapel in which many of the knitters of Ruddington worshiped. The site has been restored to show the living and working conditions of the framework knitters who occupied it throughout the nineteenth century. This is a working museum with machinery in use and the opportunity for visitors to ‘have-a-go’. The Museum is a registered charity and a working industrial museum. The only textile museum in the Nottinghamshire which also houses the only British Luddite Gallery. We work with multi generational audiences, families, community groups and schools both local and national, helping to inform and inspire, creative life long learning.
How this cause brings people in the community together
We will hold a series of reminiscence workshops with local people which will take place in the Chapel Gallery These workshops will explore and capture the oral memories of Ruddington people with a particular reference to working life past and present within the village. We will also seek to uncover any new information on the past residence/employees of the Knitters cottages. We will work with volunteers and student researchers, alongside local community groups and individuals to capture these stories for future generations and curate and an exciting new temporary exhibition which will then tell these stories to a multi generational audience. Through this project the local community will have had the opportunity to archive and share their heritage with present and future generations